An Ohio woman was arrested after she allegedly stole a car in front of police officers who had, only moments before, carted away the driver of the stolen vehicle for an entirely separate offence.
On the night of 29 October, Nelsonville police officers, had pulled over a Nissan SUV in a routine traffic stop after noticing that the car had no lights and was exuding loud fumes, WCHS reported.
The officers discovered upon running the information of the driver, Kevin McDonald, 26, that he had an active warrant out for his arrest and the car itself was owned by someone who was not currently behind the wheel.
As officers began to take the 26-year-old toward the patrol car, a woman allegedly began to “make contact” with the officers, the Athens County prosecutor said. It was then, prosecutor claimed, that the woman, later identified as 25-year-old Hannah Warren, leapt into the driver’s seat of the SUV and “sped off”.
The stolen car that Ms Warren was allegedly driving would not be spotted until the next day, when police received a report at 2pm that the 2017 Nissan was seen near South Akron Avenue in Nelsonville, located about 60 miles southeast of Columbus.
When officers had tracked the car to the downtown area and Ms Warren realised she’d been found, a 30-minute chase then ensued across the city, Fox 8 reported. The high-speed chase came to an end after Ms Warren crashed the SUV into one of the squad cars and then attempted to flee the scene on foot but was quickly stopped by one of the officers with a taser.
Ms Warren reportedly told officers that she had drugs inside the backpack that she was carrying, which included narcotics and syringes that contained methamphetamine.
Officers said in their arresting report, according to Fox 8, that they subsequently discovered these products after the 25-year-old was arrested and brought into custody.
Ms Warren faces seven charges, including two counts of felonious assault in the first and second degrees, two counts of disobeying a police officer’s order in the third and fourth degree, vandalism, receiving stolen property and grand theft of a vehicle.
Ms Warren’s was scheduled to have her first court appearance on 7 November at 10am in the Athens County Common Pleas Court.
